County coroner ignores subpoena, officials grill attorney

Stunned Macomb County commissioners blasted county coroner Dr. Daniel Spitz on Thursday for ignoring a subpoena they issued for him to answer their questions about several issues and they grilled Spitz’s attorney, who told the commissioners the medical examiner would only meet with them in private.

The Board of Commissioners has unsuccessfully attempted for two years to get Spitz, by far the highest-paid county employee, before them to answer queries about his contract, budget, operations at the morgue and his extensive workload.

“Here’s the deal — it’s called transparency. This is the only public body that meets publicly and allows our citizens to listen and speak,” said Commissioner Jim Carabelli, a Shelby Township Republican. “It seems that he (Spitz) thinks he’s too special to come here and answer questions about how he spends our tax dollars.”

His private attorney, Steve Rabaut, a prominent Macomb County criminal defense attorney, said the coroner could not appear before the board without jeopardizing ongoing criminal cases in which he may testify in court. For example, if commissioners publicly assert that Spitz is overworked, that could become an issue in a murder case in which the autopsy is a key factor and Spitz is an expert witness, according to Rabaut, a 30-year court veteran.

“I am discouraged by the Board of Commissioners’ failure to understand that, for Dr. Spitz to speak in an open forum is not in the best interests of county government … and not in the best interests of county residents,” Rabaut told the commissioners.

“His testimony (before the board) could be detrimental to ongoing investigations by law enforcement or the county prosecutor.”

Spitz’s contract is up for renewal on Dec. 31 and the board has asserted that it has sole discretion in choosing the medical examiner for 2014 and beyond.

The current contract that the Hackel administration signed in July 2012 with Spitz Pathology Group, a newly formed company created by the coroner, represents an 88 percent increase in compensation compared to his previous deal as a single contract employee making $200,000 annually.

But the new pact includes a second medical examiner and new administrative duties for Spitz. Though he is now a contract employee with ties to his own company, Spitz conducts all of his business in an office within the morgue that offers him a computer, telephone, printer and cellphone provided by the county.

The medical examiner has declined to make public his new salary or that of his new partner, Dr. Mary Pietrangelo.

At the same time, former employees have asserted that Spitz was an abrasive and derogatory boss, and that he purged the county morgue of most of the employees who worked under his predecessor, his father, Dr. Werner Spitz.

On Thursday, one commissioner after another on the 13-member board — Democrats and Republicans — stepped up to say that a private session to arrange a “script” for the rogue coroner to follow at a public session of questions was an outrageous demand.

Commissioner Bob Smith, brother of county Prosecutor Eric Smith, said the board never submits questions in advance, yet the sheriff and prosecutor have appeared before the commissioners for decades without hesitation.

“I don’t understand how Dr. Spitz is any more privileged than they are,” said Commissioner Smith, a Clinton Township Democrat. “How … is it that he is on a level that’s not accountable compared to the sheriff and prosecutor?”

Some commissioners also suggested that Spitz had engaged in a breach of his contract, which requires him to answer questions from elected county officials.

The subpoena issued by the board last month — after Spitz had snubbed them six times in two years — is allowed under the voter-approved county charter. After Spitz became a no-show, the commissioners could go to court to enforce the subpoena, though Rabaut said he doubts the board’s authority to issue such a demand, which is normally reserved for the judicial system.

The commissioners insisted the subpoena was very specific as to what issues they wanted to discuss with the coroner publicly, and that individual court cases were off limits. His attorney countered that Spitz is concerned because the demand to appear contained open-ended questions.

What happens next is murky because Rabaut seemed reluctant to stray from the demand that Spitz and the commissioners meet privately to work out the language of the questions that would be allowed in open session.

In addition to working as the county’s chief medical examiner, Spitz, who became the county coroner in 2006, also serves as the medical examiner for neighboring St. Clair County, he teaches and lectures at Wayne State University, and he conducts private autopsies and consultations.

As the county seeks national accreditation for the morgue, statistics presented by the commissioners last month indicated that Spitz performed 625 autopsies in 2011, far above the 250 limit recommended by the Nation Association of Medical Examiners. In 2012, when the second forensic pathologist, Dr. Pietrangelo came aboard halfway through the year, commissioners say that Spitz and Pietrangelo performed 572 autopsies for Macomb County, 129 for St. Clair County, and 125 on a private consultation basis — for a total of 826.

Rabaut said the figures are highly inaccurate because they combine full autopsies with simple external examinations of bodies and determinations on skeletal remains.